


the pukwudgie

by bluebeholder



Series: the accidental epic [2]
Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Bravery, Gen, Gratuitously Accurate Hair Bows, Ilvermorny, James Steward - Freeform, Self Confidence Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-11
Updated: 2018-01-11
Packaged: 2019-03-03 16:26:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13345017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluebeholder/pseuds/bluebeholder
Summary: It's Queenie Goldstein's turn to be chosen for her house at Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.The choice she makes will define her forever.





	the pukwudgie

**Author's Note:**

> Another Queenie-POV fic! I was originally planning on this being about both sisters, buuuuut I guess we'll have to have a Tina-centric one down the line. I've decided that adding more prequel fic is in everyone's best interest, so...here we go!

Queenie Goldstein is eleven years old and it is about to be her first day at Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. She’s practically trembling with excitement. Her robes—hand-me-downs from Tina—are a little too big, but the Ilvermorny crest is brilliantly colored and beautiful. And that crest is the only thing that really matters.

The other first-years are just as nervous. One girl is tugging at the too-tight collar of her robes; a boy keeps flattening down his wavy hair. All the thoughts Queenie is catching are just atremble with hopes and fears. No one’s quite comfortable, standing as they are in front of the great front doors of Ilvermorny Castle. Statues of the school’s founders flank the doors, gazing out over the landscape with serene sternness.

“I don’t understand why they don’t just take the statue of Isolt’s husband down,” a girl with long hair, held back in a big bow with stiff loops that stand out past her head, says. Oh, she looks rich! And her worldly air just screams that she’s from a real wizarding family. _It’s an offense!_

“He helped to found the school. Pukwudgie is his house,” another girl, darker than the first, points out. _Uppity…_ Queenie can’t help but stare a little: is that girl an _Indian?_ She knew, of course, that Ilvermorny accepts all sorts and isn’t half so divided as the No-Maj world, but still—it’s a surprise.

The first girl wrinkles her nose. “He was a _No-Maj_ ,” she says. She glances around. “I bet half the

kids here came from No-Maj families!” _Not real witches and wizards!_

“Everyone here’s a real witch or wizard,” Queenie says hotly, then stops, surprised by herself.

“She’s right,” a boy says stolidly. His robes are far too short, the knickerbockers showing below the hems, but he doesn’t seem to care. _Rude and mean. Is everyone like this?_ “They don’t make mistakes. And the statue of James is there ’cause even No-Majs are important!”

“Well, anyway,” the first girl—oh, that’s her name, Lottie—says. _Well!_ “I at least know I’m going to be in Wampus. All the best wizards go there. What about all of you?”

And doesn’t that just set the cat among the pigeons! Suddenly everyone’s talking and thinking and wishing. Queenie hugs herself and thinks about her own house. She’s so afraid of all of them! She isn’t very notable, as much as she’d like to be in Thunderbird like Tina, and she knows she isn’t smart enough for Horned Serpent. She’s not brave enough for Wampus, which leaves Pukwudgie, and from everything Tina’s said that fits her just fine.

Without any warning, the doors swing open wide, revealing the hall beyond, and the Headmaster of Ilvermorny, Elkanah Fischer. His smile is warm and he spreads his arms wide. “Welcome, young witches and wizards!” he says. “Your time to enter the world of magic has come at last, and the world waits to welcome you. Come in, and find your place at this school and your future!”

He must be an Occlumens, Queenie thinks: she can’t read him really at all. She hangs back, as the crowd of students ascends the steps. The boy with the too-short robes joins her at the back. “John Brown,” he says by way of introduction. _Well, I know somebody._ He looks at her horribly too-long robes. “I think you and I ought to switch robes.”

“You look fine,” Queenie says, lying through her teeth.

He laughs. _Liar! I like you._ “Thanks!”

They hurry up the steps and into the great entrance hall. Four huge statues stand at the end of the hall: the Horned Serpent, the Wampus, the Thunderbird, and the Pukwudgie. And before them, the Gordian Knot, on which they’ll stand to be sorted. Overhead and all around are the older students, watching. Queenie glances up and sees Tina, watching her; she smiles and waves but Queenie can’t quite get herself to wave back.

Headmaster Fischer stands before them. “Your house will become your family, here at the school,” he says. “You will find kindred spirits, those who share your deepest values and traits. You may belong in Horned Serpent, house of the mind, of the scholar. You may find your feet in Wampus, house of the body, of the warrior. Your friends might lie in Pukwudgie, house of the heart, of the healer. You may take flight in Thunderbird, house of the soul, of the adventurer. No house is greater or lesser than another, remember that! And step forward.”

A stern professor, a tall forbidding sort of man, opens a scroll. He begins to read off the names, one by one. Queenie is at “G” and it’s too long of a wait. John goes right up at the front; he’s barely stepped upon the knot when the crystal in the statue of the Horned Serpent illuminates. There are no cheers, though; John is only shuffled aside with the rest of the students. The only real noise is the thunderous roar of the Wampus statue. It’s even more stressful than it should be, in the vast silence of the ancient castle.

When Queenie is called up, she walks forward with her hands at her side. She steps onto the Gordian Knot, heart in her throat, and waits. There’s a long moment of silence, and then slowly the Pukwudgie raises its arrow. And then there’s a thunderous roar as the Wampus lays its claim.

Whispers erupt upstairs. What does it mean? Two at once?

“It is your choice, Miss Goldstein,” Headmaster Fischer says, voice echoing in the silence of the hall. “Wampus? Or Pukwudgie?”

Queenie stands frozen, staring up at the statues. Bravery or heart? Is she a warrior, or is she a healer? She knows the reputation of Wampus, that the greatest Aurors of MACUSA have always been from that house. They are the greatest, the boldest, the bravest. And she knows the reputation of Pukwudgie, the healers, given to a quiet life. They are the quietest of the houses, the smallest, and indeed the meekest.

Absurdly she thinks of Gibson Girls, of the pictures she keeps cut out in her books at home, pictures of the most beautiful women alive. She’s always wanted to be like them, when she grows old enough to put her hair in a pompadour and tight-lace a corset. They’re daring. Stunning. The kind of girls who would most certainly be in Wampus.

They’re the kind of girls who speak their minds and have opinions. Who wear wide bows in their hair. Who know where they’ll go, what they’ll be. They’re girls like Lottie.

Not Queenie.

“Pukwudgie,” she says.

The rest of the Sorting Ceremony is a blur. A few other students, though not many, are chosen by more than one house. None of the rest of them, when offered the choice, choose Pukwudgie. Queenie’s wand, when she receives it, is a Jonker wand, 15 inches, flexible rosewood, with a Wampus cat hair core. A gentle wand, one not made for violent acts, though its core is meant for power, like all of Jonker’s.

She holds it tight, this symbol of belonging, as they finally join the rest of the student body for the remainder of the first day’s activity. Dinner is a blur: two very kind Pukwudgie sixth-years sit on either side of her and ply her with questions and tell jokes until she starts to feel composed and happy again.

The teachers and the staff—including luminaries like Old William, the Pukwudgie who is the oldest being at Ilvermorny, and other professors with names like “Fontaine” and “Lopez” and “Graves” who are, like the Headmaster, descendants of the Original Twelve—are introduced. Head Boys and Girls, and the Prefects, all rise when called: this is, though American, a school on the Hogwarts model. And in all of this, the stress of the Sorting Ceremony is forgotten.

Tina finds Queenie, when the students break after dinner, and sweeps her about off her feet in an ecstatic hug. “You’re here!” _You’re here!_

“We’re here!” Queenie squeals, flinging her arms around her sister.

“Finally!” Tina says. Her eyes are sparkling. _So proud of you!_ “And you—you got picked by two!”

Queenie feels all the nervousness rushing back up. “It’s not so great. I picked Pukwudgie.”

“Hey,” Tina says, slinging an arm around Queenie’s shoulders, as cool as any thirteen-year-old girl is able to be. “You pick what you pick. You’d have done just fine in either. And you’ll be the bravest Pukwudgie ever!” _You’re always brave. You’re my sister!_

“You’re right,” Queenie says.

They’re passing through a hall now, walking toward the dormitories, and above an arch are images of the four house founders. Chadwick Boot of Thunderbird, Webster Boot of Wampus, Isolt Sayre of Horned Serpent…and James Steward, of Pukwudgie. A No-Maj, a founder of Ilvermorny, held in the high regard of every wizard. He has a kind, knowing face, and the way he looks down at the students seems at once brave and protective.

She pauses, right there in the middle of the flow of students, looking up at James. Queenie’s heard the school’s song and she knows the story of the founding, which Tina tells every time she’s home from school. What was it like, to be a “common wandless man”, a man who should have by all right been Obliviated and sent away, living among wizards? How frightened must he have been, confronting the Dark witch Gormlaith Gaunt to defend his family without a wand to fight with?

“Guess you can be brave, being a Pukwudgie,” Queenie murmurs, clutching her wand to her chest. Maybe people can be really brave no matter who they are. Don’t just have to be a Wampus.

“Queenie!” Tina calls out, and Queenie jerks out of her reverie. Her sister is waving at her from the other side of the arch. “Come on! Your Head Girl is looking for you!”

She breaks into a run, chasing after Tina. There are so many adventures ahead. And maybe Tina, in all her Thunderbird glory, has led the way…but Queenie thinks that, even though she’s a Pukwudgie, a witch raised apart from her family, she’ll be brave enough to see it all through.

**Author's Note:**

> The hair bow? Accurate. Take a look at Edwardian children's fashion! It's wild.
> 
> “Elkanah Fischer” is an invented character, wholesale. The name comes from one of the Original Twelve; his first name is a HIGHLY uncommon name from America in the 1850s. There’s no list of Ilvermorny headmasters, so…I made it up.


End file.
